Recognizing The Recognitions

[Erik T. Burns]

there's tweets in Gaddis too, of course; on page 306 reference is made to an
(apocryphal?) book titled _Twit Twit Twit_

On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 1:52 PM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:

>  Greeaaate f'in quote....Great!
>
> I am gonna tweet it..presently!
>
>  ------------------------------
> *From:* Erik T. Burns <eburns at gmail.com>
> *To:* Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>; pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> *Sent:* Tue, March 22, 2011 9:09:49 AM
>
> *Subject:* Re: Recognizing The Recognitions
>
> yes, laugh --
>
> "--He said, It makes the present. He said, it must be shared, and being so,
> makes the present. Laughter."
>
> (p380)
>
> This is one of my favorite quotes from _The Recognitions_ and I think
> central (pivotal!) to Gaddis' concerns. To reduce it to a twitter-sized
> soundbite: The past is very serious, the future is very serious. In the
> present, all you can do is laugh.
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 12:12 PM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>  Analytic 'spoiler"..(let's get some of this labeling out of the way, I
>> say):
>>
>> To play a big joke on modernism is one of the ways postmodernism is born?
>>
>>
>> Therefore, pivot [The Recognitions is a pivotal book?] and laugh?
>>
>>  ------------------------------
>> *From:* Erik T. Burns <eburns at gmail.com>
>> *To:* pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>> *Sent:* Tue, March 22, 2011 7:37:20 AM
>> *Subject:* Re: Recognizing The Recognitions
>>
>> "The novel began as a much shorter work"
>> Don't they all? ;-)
>>
>> I would like to argue that the "amazing erudition" of _The Recognitions_
>> is in large part a very big joke by WG on modernism, on the Eliotic need to
>> shore fragments against one's ruins, this being the most evident in Gwyon's
>> gusher in Chap 3 where there are pages and pages of references, an attempt
>> to assemble a modern mithraism out of his broad and eccentric reading. What
>> gets me is that Gwyon knows this is mostly mumbo jumbo, to ensure that the
>> priesthood retains mystery, and to ensure that the majority remains "outside
>> the mysteries."
>>
>> As impressive and enlightening and fun as scrabbling through these deep
>> piles of references can, as with TRP that should not be the main point of
>> the exercise.
>>
>> I expect we will eventually get into an argument about whether Gaddis is
>> able to create characters that are not flat, in contrast to the typical
>> critique of TRP. I find the characters in The Recognitions to be wonderful,
>> yet often deeply etched stereotypes as Gaddis works his allegory -- but
>> then, as is so often mentioned, The Recognitions is a roman à clef, and many
>> of the characters are real people Gaddis knew (incl Ernest Hemingway and of
>> course Sheri Martinelli;
>> http://www.williamgaddis.org/recognitions/martinelli/smartinellismoore.shtml),
>> so it cuts both ways.
>>
>> I am currently listening to the extraordinary audiobook of _The
>> Recognitions_. Nick Simpson proves that the characters are anything but
>> flat.
>>
>> etb
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 11:13 AM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>wrote:
>>
>>> Gaddis spent seven years writing The Recognitions. The novel began as a
>>> much
>>> shorter work and as an explicit parody of Goethe’s Faust. During the
>>> period in
>>> which Gaddis was writing the novel, he travelled to Mexico, Central
>>> America and
>>> Europe.
>>> Gaddis also found the title for the novel in The Golden Bough as Frazer
>>> noted
>>> how Goethe’s Faust originally came from the Clementine Recognitions, a
>>> third-century theological tract (See Clementine literature). It was from
>>> this
>>> point on that Gaddis began to expand the novel. The novel was completed
>>> in
>>> 1949.[3]
>>> [edit]
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
>
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